


Cats and Crows and Mischief: A Collection

by bizzylizzy



Category: Naruto
Genre: Gen, M/M, Other, ShiIta Week 2019
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-13
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2020-12-14 09:22:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21013454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bizzylizzy/pseuds/bizzylizzy
Summary: A collection of Itachi and Shisui centric prompts and chapters for Shiita Week 2019. Warnings and summaries are contained in each chapter before the prompts.





	1. 10/13 Day One: Reanimation

**Author's Note:**

> CONTENT WARNINGS: Character death and cannabalism (ish).

The clan asked Shisui to follow Itachi.

A month ago, Shisui would have agreed, but for different reasons. He would have known why the clan wanted Itachi watched. 

Shisui agreed because he had already been watching Itachi, and he needed to take it a step farther. To say Itachi was behaving oddly would be an exaggeration. Itachi generally behaved oddly. He came and went at odd hours normally. He kept his emotions close. He had multiple agendas (other people's) he had to follow and play. He only, Shisui thought, became his truest and least guarded self in Shisui's presence, and even Shisui got a bit of distance.

The past month, Itachi had not been himself. Not quite. He had been ill for about three days, but Fugaku had played it off as a stomach flu. Shinobi were not immune to illness, and he said Itachi would be well in a few days. Shisui had not thought much of it, as he'd been leaving on a mission the day he learned of it. He dropped something off with Mikoto for Itachi and went on his way. 

Shisui hadn't seen much of Itachi since he ha'd gotten back. They had spoken briefly, and Itachi had been polite if brief. Shisui knew why the clan thought Itachi had begun acting strangely. They thought Itachi was acting strangely because Itachi was a spy. Shisui knew that. He knew the truth of it, but Shisui thought Itachi was acting oddly for entirely different reasons than the clan. Itachi was not acting like Itachi.

Itachi looked perfectly like himself. He moved like himself, if maybe a bit more graceful. He spoke in the same tones and cadence. He carried and conducted himself in a way so patently Itachi, it was as if someone had decided to act like Itachi and put on his skin as a costume. Shisui had mentioned it to Sasuke, asking after his brother, and before an answer, Shisui had seen this tiny twinge on Sasuke's face. He had seen that instinctive recoil Shisui had felt when he'd spoken to Itachi mirrored in Sasuke's face.

Tonight, Shisui watched Itachi leave his house, the compound, and head into the woods. Shisui had decided he needed to confront Itachi somewhere private and get an answer.

Itachi moved easily through the darkness, quicker than Shisui remembered him being. Shisui assured himself this was not true. Shisui was looking too closely for differences in Itachi’s behavior, and his mind had kindly fabricated little inconsistencies. Shisui followed Itachi for an hour, and then lost sight of him.

It happened instantly. Itachi was leaping from one branch to another, and then he was not. Shisui jarred to a stop on the next branch and froze. He scanned the forest with his Sharingan. He listened hard for any sounds beneath the normal night chatter. He heard nothing. He saw nothing.

"I'm never going to catch anything with you crashing around behind me," A very soft, _gentle_ voice said behind him.

Shisui spun.

Itachi crouched on a branch above Shisui, knees by his shoulders and hands braced on the branch between his feet.

"I see. You're him. The best friend. The one who knows me best," Itachi added with a soft, pleased note to the words. Shisui felt the same sense of wrong. He felt something repulsive in his core and he would have stepped back if he could. Itachi hadn't had the Sharingan activated this entire time, and now as he blinked his eyes changed. They were luminous and yellow and the pupils were large enough to take up almost all the color.

Shisui struck without even thinking about it. The reaction was instant, but Itachi slid under the blow, faster than he should be, and kicked Shisui so hard in the temple that he passed out.  
\--  
Shisui woke up to the sound of someone eating. It was not a clean eating. A wet, slurping kind of eating that suggested raw flesh and organ meat. As he lay in the deadfall, Shisui heard the crunch and crack of bones. He stared into the darkness. He couldn't move. He wouldn't move.

"I know you're awake," the very soft voice said.

Shisui slowly pushed himself up. His head spun. The vertigo passed as he made it upright and looked over. It was still dark. With the Sharingan, Shisui could make out Itachi sitting by the carcass of a deer. It had been split from chest to groin, body pulled open, skin peeled back to reveal ribs. Organs had been removed.

Itachi's hands were bloody.

So was his mouth.

His eyes were luminous in the dim light.

"What," Shisui began. He stopped. "What happened to Itachi."

The creature in Itachi's skin nodded. "Uchiha Itachi died three weeks and five days ago."

Shisui felt his heart stop. Blood drained from his face. For a moment, he thought he would pass out, and then everything rushed back in. His heart pounded. His face flushed. He wanted to vomit.

"What. . ." Shisui's voice shook. "Are you?"

The not-Itachi licked blood off his finger, pausing at the question. The gesture, Itachi's movements, everything fell into a horrific place, and Shisui answered his own question. "A nekomata."

Itachi chuckled, lower and more musical than Itachi's laughs had been. How long had it been since Shisui had heard Itachi laugh? That could just be how he sounded now. Shisui's chest constricted.

"_Bakeneko_, nothing as grand as a nekomata, yet," Itachi's shoulders shrugged in a fluid motion.

Shisui's mind began making connections and speculation as his heart dropped into his stomach and wallowed there. Itachi had been dead three weeks.

How could that be right?

How could it be possible?

But it made _sense_. It explained the oddness and the eerie acting of the creature in front of him. It was not Itachi. It was a demon in his skin or something like that.

"How did it happen?" Shisui managed.

"The death? That I don't know. All I know is Uchiha Fugaku, head of his clan, brought me the cold, dead body of his son and asked for it to be brought back to life." The creature in Itachi's skin made an open-handed motion. "And I obliged as far as I was able."

"What does that mean: as far as you were able?" Shisui's nose was full of the smell of blood.

The bakeneko made a soft noise. "The body had been dead for...perhaps a full day when it was brought. That knowledge isn't an exact thing. I was given an appropriate offering, so I animated the body. I pushed out the decay happening and replaced what needed replacement with the offering I was brought."

"But you're not Itachi."

"No." The cat agreed. "I am not. I was bound to act as if nothing had happened. I was charged to play the dutiful son, and I have."

"You have Itachi's memories?" Shisui asked. He could feel part of himself falling down. Part of his soul crushed again, thinking _not again, not again, not again._

"No, but we have some arts to divine things. Other things I know because I am old. I know. . ." The cat paused, counting on bloody fingers. "Your clan plots a coup. I know this child--" A hand placed on an empty chest. "--was spying for ANBU on your clan." The cat paused to wait for a reaction. He smiled.

"And I was told that _you_ are Uchiha Itachi's greatest friend. Or." Another pause. "You were."

Another cut to the soul. Another pang. An odd sort of stillness inside of him.

"I am."

"Then, if I am truly to play my role as charged, and be as close to the true Uchiha Itachi as possible, I must count on you to guide me, cousin," And the cat smiled at Shisui with an open joy Shisui had never had the privilege of seeing on Itachi's face. 

"Stop," Shisui commanded, voice thick. The demon's face shuttered, human emotion gone.

"You will have to get better at playing this role, cousin," the cat cautioned. It cocked Itachi's head. "Or are we going to have a falling out?"

Shisui took hold of his emotions. He stared back at the cat, the stillness of the dimly lit face eerie. The smell of the dead deer rose in his nostrils. He hated it. He wanted it gone. He wanted to wash the blood off of Itachi's face. He wanted to wake up, and he had never wished so badly something was a dream since he was a child. He had long ago counted that a useless sentiment. 

They lived in horror, and only action would change that, but this seemed such a catastrophic unfairness. Itachi was dead. Itachi and his gentle minded ways, his pacifism had died. Somehow. Shisui hadn’t even known for weeks. He didn’t even know how it had happened. He had no evidence and no body. He simply had this demon in Itachi’s flesh. Shisui felt bereft. Every plan had to be changed. The universe had to be reordered. 

It didn't seem possible.

It certainly wasn't fair.

The crunch of bone started Shisui out of his stupor. The cat crunched on a bone of the deer, pausing as Shisui refocused. With the Sharingan, Shisui could see how chakra had sharpened teeth into cat fangs to tear into the meat and bone.

"What are you doing?" 

"This body is dead." The cat wiped blood from Itachi's face. "I can slow the decomposition, but the body isn't _alive_ anymore, so it doesn't do any of the things a body normally does, such as repair itself when damaged, or grow, as I believe it is expected to do soon. To keep it working and looking alive, I have to ingest raw materials to replace what is lost.

"A deer works for the smaller things, but, eventually, it will have to be human flesh," the cat reported calmly, eyes on Shisui. Shisui felt the hair rise on his body. Revulsion rippled through him. 

"Have you made a decision?" The cat asked. "It would be very awkward for everyone if we ceased to be friends."  
~  
"Fugaku-sama." Normally Shisui would not seek Fugaku out this directly. He would make requests and wait and be circumspect. Fugaku looked up from the reports he had been looking through. Shisui had chosen a time when Mikoto would be out of the house. Sasuke was at the Academy.

"What," Shisui asked as he stepped into the room and lowered his voice. "Happened to Itachi."

Shisui watched the shift of Fugaku's features. It wasn't much. Fugaku was a master at keeping everything closed. He didn't reveal much. He never did. "Is this about you're being asked to watch him?" Fugaku asked.

"This--" Shisui's throat closed a bit. "How did he die?"

Time could have stopped. Nothing moved, Shisui could barely breathe.

"You saw Itachi this morning at the meeting." The words were careful and precise.

"What _happened_?" Shisui demanded. He held very tightly to every emotion. He compacted them down inside himself and he forced himself to stillness. To quiet.

"I _saw_ it. It _spoke_ to me," Shisui spoke lower. He felt the frantic panic deep in his chest. He wanted Fugaku to explain everything. He wanted to find a reason to believe Itachi was live. He needed to know why when he looked at his best friend, he saw nothing familair or comforting.

He only saw death.

"I understand," Fugaku said, with his impeccable preciseness. "Itachi has been acting oddly lately, and that is why--"

Shisui had the terrible thought. He had the unthinkable conviction that Fugaku had discovered Itachi's treachery. Fugaku had known his precious genius son was spying on the clan for ANBU, and he had eliminated the leak. He had killed Itachi. The impossibility of Fugaku killing Itachi did not seem to matter. The skill difference alone should make it unthinkable. Add in everything else--

"--my son," Fugaku was saying. Shisui struggled with his panic. He fought down his convictions. He stared through the head of his clan and wondered how much he knew. How much did he suspect? How far would he go to protect his clan?

How far to protect his son?

Shisui didn't let Fugaku finish. He walked out of the room. He walked through the house and was going towards the door when it opened. Itachi stood there. He blinked at Shisui, softly surprised. He smiled that soft secret little smile.

And Shisui felt his entire reasoning mind come undone.  
~  
"Did Fuagku kill him?" Shisui asked the demon sitting in his windowsill. 

"I told you, I don't know."

Shisui could not even get the cat to speculate on the Itachi's manner of death. It could have been murder. It could have been an accident. It could have been an illness. But what had kept Fugaku from taking his son to a medic? Did Mikoto know? Did anyone? What had happened and why hadn't it been fixed? Had someone in the clan poisoned Itachi? Had ANBU? What had happened?

And who had done it?

"You haven't considered," The cat said in Itachi's lowering register. "He might have done it himself."

"No."

The cat remained silent, but judging from the window. 

"He wouldn't," Shisui insisted, but everything was doubt. Itachi's body watched him with a demon's gaze, and Fugaku would not even admit his son was dead. No one could really look at this thing and think it was Itachi. None of his family could really be fooled, could they?

"You," The demon said through Itachi's lips. "Would know best."  
~  
Shisui went through Itachi's room for any clues. If Itachi had left any obvious notes, Fugaku would have removed them. Shisui checked everywhere. He unfolded every bit of clothing. He checked every crevice and crack. He checked and rechecked with the Sharingan.

Every pass turned up less. The room had an odd quality to it now. The cat kept it very neat, but Itachi's room had always been strangely impersonal. Shisui found only a small box of trinkets and keepsakes. It looked like treasures from a younger Itachi. Shiny river rocks, a feather, a ribbon, and a few baby teeth were tucked and cushioned with a scrap of cloth. A lock of someone's hair was in it as well. Shisui stared at the box and tried to piece together what had happened.

Ultimately, his mind stopped as it hit the roadblock of "Itachi is dead." When he tried to process out the puzzle, his mind stalled on that moment. That reality. He could not process it. He could not fully realize it, even having seen the demon and spoke to it and known it could not be Itachi.

He couldn't accept it, which was a major failing. Shisui was a shinobi, and he must accept death. He must accept reality. He must be rational and reasonable and always.

Always.

Mikoto came into Itachi's room near evening. She didn't seem very surprised to see Shisui. She gathered up the box's contents, which had spilled. She sat down beside Shisui and arranged them back into the box before sitting back and looking at the room. Shisui had put it all back perfectly. It did not look touched.

It didn't look like anyone lived there.

Shisui ached to ask Mikoto is she knew. He hadn't considered it possible, but she didn't ask why he was here. She didn't question anything. She hadn't asked about Itachi. She simply sat beside him.

Shisui couldn't bring himself to ask.

Because, in the end, he wasn't sure it mattered.  
\--  
The demon swallowed a live mouse whole.

"I can't get healed." It shrugged at Shisui. Shisui had gone looking and found the cat in the forest, scavenging. He hadn't seen Itachi eat since he died. "If I take too many deer the Nara might start asking questions."

"You wanted me to tell you what Itachi would do?" Shisui asked. The cat stopped expression perfectly a cat with pricked ears.

"Have you decided to work with me on that point, cousin?" The cat barely flinched as the kunai almost cut his cheek.

"Don't call me that," Shisui commanded. "Why do you want me to tell you how to act?"

"Because Fugaku only specified that I had to act like his son," The cat paused for emphasis. "And. I was told you were Itachi's closest friend. I believe I was given this information to warn me to keep my distance from you, but, if I am truly to assume the guise of the departed, you can provide me with valuable insight."

"You're going to doublecross me as well," Shisui said.

"No.” Cat froze and then darted across the ground, leaping three strides up a tree before landing. He was holding a squirrel in his hands. It was already limp. "You didn't make a deal with me. My deal was to Fugaku. I was told to impersonate his son. Would Itachi tell his father anything you told him?" Cat cocked his head.

"No," Shisui admitted. He didn't know if Fugaku had been panicked or made too many assumptions when he had brought this demon back inside his son's corpse. "We had a plan, and I will tell you, but you have to keep it secret from everyone. You must follow it."

"I will," The cat said solemnly. Shisui didn't trust it, but he understood why Fugaku had done this. Without Itachi, so many Uchiha plans lost their teeth, including Shisui’s plans.

"Promise."

"I will follow your words and instructions not only in word but in spirit," The cat promised.

"Why?"

"Because cats only kill what we need to eat," the cat said, which meant it knew far more than Shisui suspected. "War is a human game, and. . ."

The cat smiled. "I don't care for living in dead human flesh."  
~  
At first, Shisui had been determined to kill the cat. It seemed like the only decent end of Itachi. Then, Sisui had realized he was in a corner. He had lost his only ally, and, in a way, Shisui became glad that Itachi had died.

He didn't have to watch their clan devolve into warmongering. He didn't have to endure ANBU's rigorous mission schedule. He didn't have to lie about his family. Itachi had been freed from all of these obligations and impossible choices.

Which left Shisui and his demon pawn. The cat understood politics and strategy, but Shisui didn't dare rely on it too much. None of the other Uchiha seemed to understand how "oddly" Itachi was acting. They suspected things, but not the truth.

Shisui heard Fugaku had told Sasuke not to hang around Itachi as much, but no one ever said it.

No one ever suggested the body walking around the compound was not Uchiha Itachi.

"You've grown," Shisui said it without thinking. It was more than that. Itachi's body had matured. His jaw had become more defined. His limbs were longer. His hands were less full, more graceful.

"I thought it was time for it," The cat seemed pleased with the assessment. "But it took time to get the materials."

The cat had been absent for a week on a mission. Shisui tried not to think about what kind of materials had been needed and where they had come from.

"I thought it would be more useful to have an attractive face, so I modeled the changes after the mother instead of the father," the cat went on. Shisui found himself unwillingly looking for similarities between Itachi's former face and Mikoto's. He didn't see them. He saw Itachi still. 

"Do you find it attractive?" The cat asked.

"No." It was still too difficult to asses the face without thinking of Itachi. It only struck Shisui as wrong now, and he hoped that feeling wouldn't fade. He would press all other memories and thoughts _down_ and _out_ and focus on the alien nature of the thing wearing Itachi's skin. It wouldn't even be Itachi after much longer. It would be replaced by everything the cat consumed over the weeks. It would grow into something entirely inhuman over the years.

Would it be around for years?

"This is my plan," Shisui told the cat.  
~  
"That didn't go as planned," Cat said.

Shisui hunched over, bleeding from the gorey wound in his face.

"I would say it went precisely _not_ as planned," Cat seemed pleased with this.

"You're going to have to kill them to stop the war, Cat," Shisui said. The blood loss and pain made it hard to think.

"Am I?" Cat asked. Over the weeks the cat's face had become less and less Itachi's. If anyone noticed they would call it puberty. They would say he was growing up.

"Yes." Maybe it was good Itachi had died.

"Would Itachi do it?" The cat asked.

"Yes," Shisui lied. He didn't know anymore.

"Would you?" Cat asked.

The pain made Shisui want to vomit. He could hear the river below them. "Yes.

"They can't find out." Shisui was losing lucidity. He was going to pass out. "The clan can't know that Root. . ." Shisui had to stop to vomit. The cat looked down at him, the Sharingan active in its eyes. The cat had all of Itachi's genetics. It had kept the eyes intact and working somehow. 

Shisui felt the idea seize him. He felt the weight lift. He saw the end.

And he wondered again, if Itachi had felt that way before death, or if it were an ultimate betrayal to wonder if he had removed himself from these games.

"You need to--" Shisui tried to stand, and the cat caught him. Shisui looked into a face he would have called beautiful if it were on a human. He looked at the red eyes and the still face and realized he could not leave his clan at the mercy of a demon, even if it had been summoned by Fugaku.

"No." Shisui corrected, even though he hadn't said it yet. The cat knew. The cat always _knew_ too much. "_No._"

The cat smiled, very gently, with Itachi's lips and Itachi's eyes.

And pushed Shisui backward over the edge.  
-  
Shisui woke with the taste of blood in his mouth. He sat up.

His body felt wrong.

Heavy.

Light.

Disconnected.

Shisui froze. A body lay in the shallows of the river. Blood pooled around it. The shadowed shape of a cat the size of a large dog crouched over the body. It lifted its head, luminous in the moonlight. Blood and gore dripped from its chin. 

Shisui tried to stand. He staggered, nearly falling down the bank into the river below. He froze. 

Itachi's face looked up at him.

Shisui looked up. The cat was gone. He made himself walk to the body. He didn't need to. He really didn't need to.

Flesh and bone had been removed, but what hair there was on the scalp confirmed it. The clothes helped. Shisui felt the rising gorge as he looked down at his corpse from inside what had once been Itachi’s body. Blood from Itachi's Mangekyou ran down his face, dripping onto Shisui's fresh corpse.

Shisui heard in the night the deep-throated purr of a cat, greedy and content retreating into the night.  
~  
"You missed the meeting last night," Fuagku said to his son.

Shisui looked away from the mirror where he'd been studying Itachi's face. He looked at Fugaku. 

"I'm sorry," Itachi's voice said softly as Shisui willed it. "I had other duties to attend to." Shisui expected Fugaku to address the demon. He expected a reprimand, and he waited for it. He would leap into that opening and tear into the secrets there.

"The duties of your clan should take priority, Itachi," Fugaku chastised without a change of tone. Shisui felt his heartbeat double in his chest. He felt his breathing quicken. Something happened in his face that made Fugaku step back. For a moment, Shisui saw fear and regret and something very close to guilt.

"Of course," Shisui said with Itachi's perfectly polite diction. "Fugaku-sama. I apologize for forgetting my priorities. I won't happen again."

"See that you don't," Fugaku said. He retreated, leaving Shisui in the bathroom. Shisui looked to Itachi's face in the mirror. He'd spent all night trying to find any trace of Itachi in this body and this mind, but there was nothing. Just Shisui. Only Shisui now.

"I think it's actually best you aren't here for this," Shisui told his reflection. Shisui touched two fingers to the reflection, allowing himself the moment of grief before he walked out. It was time to do what needed to be done.


	2. 10/16 Day Four: Confessions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some days you just want to write self indulgent college confessions.
> 
> And you do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is actually set in an reincarnation AU, but that felt like too much to get into for this since it was already dragging on.
> 
> I really needed a break from all the angst I've been dishing out.

To say Shisui was a daredevil or thrill-seeker would be incorrect. Then again, he didn’t exactly have the same amount of caution most people had. At five he had fearless climbs a tree, jumped to a roof, and scaled a chimney to retrieve a toy. In elementary school, he stood in front of bullies without flinching, even if he never threw a punch (that came in highschool). Shisui had been born with an excellent sense of his body, although he would never play any sports and a strange drive in his bones for _something more_. In Shisui’s town that meant hiking and rock climbing and trying new things. It meant summers being a roadie for his mother’s band, and then full time with her while he homeschooled after his dad died. 

Shisui felt _exotic_ among the other freshman. He stood about a head taller than most of them, and the tattoos and old road rash scars made them step away and eye him. Anko stood beside him, getting more stares than he did, but he blamed that on her cleavage. Everyone was growing bored with orientation, which was better than the nerves. 

As the congratulations began to wind down, the speaker had everyone stand and separate out into groups. Shisui and Anko had because Anko traded with someone, gotten into the same group. They had a C on their name tags and huddled into a small group, watching other people nervously search for their places. A diminutive freshman sidestepped the crowd and stood beside Shisui, watching everyone else.

The kid was tiny, bird boned with huge, thick glasses that seemed to dominate his face. His hair was long, in less a shaggy unkempt way a lot of guys did and in a far more passionate vain way. It was in a low ponytail, and what little of his face wasn’t consumed by glasses was hidden by his thick bangs. He was wearing what looked like a hand-knitted sweater over a T-shirt, jeans, and nondescript tennis shoes. Shisui was trying to decide if the kid was cute or not when they were all told they would be getting a tour of the campus from their senior student as a guide. Most of the other groups had an obviously older student already talking to the group.

“Where’s ours?” Anko asked.

“I’m right here,” The small, child-like guy said. He glanced over at their little group, not looking particularly thrilled and cleared his throat. He looked down at a sticky note on his palm, which read: name, year, major. “ I’m Itachi. I’m a senior mathematics student and I’m going to show you around the campus. We’re going to start with the cafeteria. It’s this way.”

“You’re a senior? How old are you, twelve?” Anko demanded.

“Seventeen,” Itachi replied, owl eyes nonplussed behind his glasses. “I started early.”

“No _shit_.” Anko drawled the word out. She wasn’t pleased. Shisui wondered if she had expected some hot senior ass to amuse her. People who would volunteer to show freshmen around were not the sort of people Anko would be interested in.

“We’re going to start with the cafeteria,” Itachi informed them as he started walking that way. Anko shot Shisui a disgusted look, and Shisui could see she was plotting some kind of trouble. Anko normally plotted trouble. Shisui watched the steady swing of their guide’s ponytail. It reached his waist. 

He had his jeans rolled up at the cuff. 

Shisui almost stepped on Itachi as he abruptly stopped and motioned to the cafeteria, launching into a precise lecture on the meal plans, foodstuffs, hours, and other rules and advisories. It had obviously been scripted and regurgutated verbatim. At the end, he asked for questions.

“Am I supposed to remember all of that?” Anko asked, caustically.

Itachi smiled just a fraction. “That’s up to you.” Itachi seemed to think that was the end of the questions, and he directed them out another door, down to the computer lab. The entire tour went like this: long lectures on every conceivable detail about every area they visited delivered in a not quite monotone that was obviously driving Anko to distraction.

Something probably would have gone horribly wrong without the distraction. On their way through a large common area, someone whistled and called Itachi’s name. Itachi turned his head and went obediently to a table of what in highschool Shisui would have designated the cool kids. The one who whistled and waved was incredibly blonde and energetic. There was a girl with pink hair, a punk emo guy knitting furiously, and a cheerleader type. Itachi walked right to the chair with the knitter in it and leaned into it, forward to listen to the blonde talk. The knitter leaned back, tilting his head to look at Itachi before jerking his head down to respond to the blonde. The blonde laughed and Itachi waved a hand before beginning to drift back to his group. The knitter caught Itachi’s sweater and asked what time he’d be done. Itachi listed what they had left to visit and promised he’d text when they were finished before drifting back to his group.

“I apologize,” Itachi said, sinking back into professor mode.

“Who were they?” Anko asked.

“My roommates--well, most of them,” Itachi immediately launched into his spiel on the computer lab, and Shisui honestly wouldn’t have thought much more of it.

Or he wouldn’t have if Itachi the Professor did not end up in his Music Appreciation class.  
-  
Shisui started to pick a seat at the back of the auditorium when he saw a thick, black ponytail fussed into a bun that bared a neck too long and graceful for a nerdy guy with thick glasses. On a whim, Shisui hefted his bag and made his way down to the front, dropping his things beside Itachi.

Itachi didn’t jump, but looked sideways and then slowly up, as if expecting a trick. He blinked a moment, and Shisui had the devastating suspicion Itachi did not recognize him or remember his name.

Shisui forged on, ignoring this. “How did _you_ end up in Music Appreciation? Mr. Senior started early.”

Itachi’s lips quirked up a fraction. Recognition appearing in the owl eyes as soon as Shisui spoke. “I lost a bet.”

“....what kind of bet?” Shisui asked as he sat, propping his chin on his hand. 

“One that said I needed to appreciate the arts more,” Itachi replied. He was wearing a knitted scarf today, not for fashion but because it was cold. “And that I should take easy classes for once.”

“Good, I can cheat off your answers then,” Shisui grinned charmingly, and Itachi looked amused.

“I know nothing about music,” Itachi admitted. “And I’m tone deaf.”

“Then have no fear. I will teach you everything I know about music. I was in a rock band.” Basically, anyway.

Itachi had the smallest, amused little grin on his face. “Somehow, I’m not surprised.”  
-  
Shisui had two kinds of crushes. The first and most common was the “you’re hot, let’s fuck” kind of crush. The second was an emotionally perilous need to take someone home, feed them, wrap them in warm blankets, and watch the rain fall outside kind of thing.

Itachi had inspired the second with an alarming intensity by their third class together. This was an issue, as Itachi was a mostly blind genius with no artistic talents, a very bland style of dress, almost monotone speech pattern, and the tiniest of smiles that made Shisui’s knees go weak and his heart flutter. Given time, Shisui could have corrected a few of those things, or gotten used to them, but the bigger issue was Itachi had a boyfriend.

A politically active, social justice conscious, student organization and university-wide known graduate student who evidently knitted half of Itachi’s wardrobe. They lived together. The boyfriend rode a motorcycle and walked Itachi to and from most of his classes. He was protective and Itachi smiled charmingly for him as he did for no one else.

Itachi was dating Sasuke.

Sasuke was part of a group of graduate and beyond students that everyone on campus knew. They were the standard to meet. The had good grades or excellent studies to their names with groundbreaking research or did an insane amount of volunteer work on and off campus. They were the campus golden children, and everyone called them the Konoha 9, although there were more than nine of them. Sasuke happened to be part of the Main Three, for some reason called Team 7. The Konoha 9 were all impressive, but Team 7 were the cream of the crop.

Shisui heard Sasuke and Sakura debating in the cafeteria one day and looked at Anko in despair. Professors didn’t sound as composed and educated as these two. They were eloquent and educated and they talked about things everyone knew mattered. They had plans for action and actually _acted_ on those plans.

“I can’t beat that,” He groaned softly.

Anko glanced over at Sasuke. “Why do you need to beat him?” Shisui meant to drop the subject, but his eyes skipped to Itachi, sitting calmly in the seat next to Sasuke as he read some massive tome, oblivious to the world shattering debate going on above his head.

“No, no way.” Anko slapped Shisui. “Shut up.” She laughed, and it seemed like everyone turned to look at them.

“Shit, you need to get laid,” Anko gasped. Shisui sank down into his seat and peered back at Itachi. Itachi was looking back at him. He smiled as their eyes met, raising his fingers in hello before going back to his book. Shisui sank down more, feeling his face burning.

“Okay, fine, maybe I do,” Shisui grumbled.

Shisui knew absolutely one hundred percent that would not help.  
-  
Itachi was not helping matters. 

The professor was not helping matters.

Itachi was Shisui’s group partner for the _entire_ semester.

Which meant they needed to attend a concert together and write about the experience. As Itachi knew nothing about music and listened to very little, Shisui had to pick. It was agony. And it didn’t stop when he’d picked a concert, because he had to pick what to wear and if they would picnic or buy overpriced food.

Anko laughed herself sick at Shisui, and Shisui made possibly the worst decision ever. An outdoor concert in February.

On Valentine's Day.

Sasuke was going to scalp him. Shisui had tried to salvage the situation by suggesting Sasuke could come with them. Luckily Sasuke had not decided to come with them.

Shisui arrived an hour early. He sat in his car and had the strong urge to vomit until someone knocked on his window.

It was Itachi, with Sasuke looming behind him. Itachi looked ready for an expedition to the arctic. Shisui hurriedly popped out of the car. Sasuke was scowling, bundled up only a little less than Itachi. Sasuke gave Shisui a look of extreme dislike. Somehow, Shisui had always thought Sasuke was much taller than this. He was actually shorter than Shisui. It did not make Shisui feel any safer.

“Call me when you’re done,” Sasuke told Itachi.

“I can drive him home.” The words burst out of Shisui before he could properly contemplate them. 

Sasuke’s look was cutting, but Itachi nodded. “It’s not that far.” Shisui shifted uncomfortably as Itachi and Sasuke shared a look that seemed to be a continuation of an extended argument and felt very much left out. Sasuke finally sighed.

“I know,” Itachi smiled just a fraction, and Shisui’s stomach flipped. “I’ll text you.”

“That’s a lie, you never remember to text me,” Sasuke pulled his gloves back on. “I’m calling _you_.”

“I’ll keep my phone on,” Itachi promised. Sasuke shot Shisui another look that made him want to crawl under his car before stalking back to his bike. Itachi watched Sasuke go with a silly smile before looking at Shisui. Shisui wished he would vomit so he could just go home.

“Which band are we going to see?”

“Oh, well…” Shisui fumbled and pulled out the flyer. “A couple are playing, so I thought we could...sample and see what we like.”

“What did you want to see?” Itachi asked, looking over Shisui’s arm at the flyer. He set a hand on Shisui’s arm, pulling it out of his way.

Shisui might pass out.

“I--” This semester had established that Itachi had no taste in music. Shisui could, with impunity, pick the music they listened to today. Itachi wouldn’t question it or complain, but he probably also wouldn’t like it.

Shisui turned to face Itachi to get Itachi’s hand off his arm. “We’re sampling until _you_ hear something you _really_ like. I haven’t seen you emotionally engage with anything we’ve listened to this entire semester, so that’s our project. Conversion of a music skeptic.”

“That’s not our project.”

“It’s music appreciation. If we turn in the tickets and the paper no one will care. I think if I told the professor that you liked something he’d burst into tears and gives us both 100% for the course. So let’s start with something I know you’ll hate, deal?” Shisui looked at Itachi. For a moment Itachi just looked bemused, but he smiled a little, tipping his head to regard Shisui in a way that made canyons in his heart.

“All right,” Itachi agreed. “I’m at your mercy.”  
~  
“It’s not that bad,” Anko insisted.

“He got food poisoning.” Shisui lay across the cafeteria table.

“That’s not the end of the world,” Anko rolled her eyes.

“He went to the _hospital_ for _food poisoning_ from food _I_ bought him,” Shisui hissed. “I could not have fucked that up more if I tried.” Shisui sat back and then froze. Sasuke had just walked into the cafeteria. Shisui tried to slide down into his seat, but Sasuke looked straight at him with absolute disgust.

“He’s going to kill me,” Shisui muttered to Anko.

“Maybe, you should go see him,” Anko suggested.

“Sasuke?” Shisui almost yelped. Anko kicked him.

“No, the kid you _poisoned._”

“That’s a great idea because he lives with his boyfriend, and I really will die if I go there,” Shisui hissed back. Anko rolled her eyes again.

“You’re pathetic.” Anko stood up. “University has turned you into a milksop.”

“This is exactly like your 'don’t date married people' clause,” Shisui countered.

“No, it’s you being a coward.” She grabbed her backpack. “You made the first move by asking him out on Valentine’s Day!”

“It was for class!”

“You go see him, or next time you mention Itachi to me, I will throw you out the nearest window,” Anko snapped.

“....do I really talk about him _that_ much?”

“Yes,” Anko growled. “It’s fucking _constant_. Do something about it.”  
~  
“Oh, Shisui.” A pink haired woman opened the door. It was Sakura. She was wearing a huge sweatshirt and leggings. And a face mask. “Did Itachi ask you to bring him some coursework? Because that’s banned until he can walk downstairs by himself.”

“No, I--” Shisui stopped. “I just wanted to see how he was doing.”

“Did you talk to Sasuke? Because anytime Itachi had anything less than perfect health it’s a disaster to him.” Sakura stepped to the side and motioned Shisui in. “Itachi is very resilient.”

Shisui thought of Itachi’s innocent features and how small he always seemed swaddled in all the different knitted things Sasuke stuffed him into. “I still thought I should check, you know since I--” Shisui made a useless hand gesture. “Picked the food stall.”

“A purge every once in a while is good for you,” Sakura shrugged. Shisui thought she was into something medical at the school. Pre-med? Something else? He did know she was a judo champion or something like that. He’d seen her in the university gym and she put every athlete Shisui had ever known to shame. She could deadlift cars. “And it isn’t like you poisoned him.”

The pause was awkward and long enough Shisui wanted to walk back out. “No.” Shisui managed to say. This was worse than meeting your date’s parents, because he couldn’t stop the feeling Sakura was judging him. Here he was stopping by to visit Sasuke’s boyfriend while Sasuke was out _after_ taking Sasuke’s boyfriend out on Valentine’s Day. 

Sakura gave Shisui a worried look. Concerned look. A look that said maybe she was thinking he should just go right back out that door.

“If you’re going up, please take him something to drink and some more crackers,” Sakura finally said. “He might be asleep.”

“I’ll go if he is. . .” Shisui promised, following Sakura into the living room as she went into the kitchen. The house had looked odd enough from the outside, but the inside was an eclectic mix of art, pictures of people, and in the center wall of the living room a very detailed nude of Uzumaki Naruto.

“Isn’t it hideous?” Sakura asked as she came out of the kitchen carrying a small jar and a sleeve of crackers. “Sasuke and I were drunk when we agreed to it. Year-end bender. It gets out of hand.” Someone had censored the nude with a poster about STD’s which someone had drawn a penis on.

“I’ll just…” Shisui motioned, having no idea where to go.

“Up these stairs, take a left to the end of the hall and up those stairs. He’s in the loft room.” With that, Sakura left, abruptly vanishing around a corner. Shisui stood staring at the nude Naruto for a second longer before he went upstairs.

It didn’t sound like anyone else was home. Shisui made his way gingerly through the house, trying not to look into rooms and see what exactly was going on in them. Most of them had very artistic nameplates that designated them as “bathroom” or “Naruto’s Den of Sin” or “Linen Closet” including little notations about “free access” or “off limits.” Shisui had learned very quickly after arriving on campus that Uzumaki Naruto liked to throw a low of parties. He also threw very strange parties with bizarre themes. Shisui had never been invited. He had only peeked into a few of the “free access” rooms when he stopped in his tracks.

It was Sasuke’s room.

Shisui looked down the hall. He looked up the hall. He listened for any sounds, and then he slowly stepped into the room.

It didn’t look anything like Shisui had expected. It wasn’t really neat. Shisui had expected immaculate order from someone who seemed as uptight as Sasuke. He had five bookcases, mostly filled with academic texts and then an entire bookcase of various comics from around the world. There was also, and most interestingly, a rack of snakes. Shisui didn’t step in to look at them. A messy basket of yarn sat against the wall, and a knitting project was on the desk next to a laptop. Sasuke had a beanbag chair and a bed all crowded into the room. 

Most interesting were the pictures. Most were of Sakura, Sasuke, and Naruto from what looked like middle school forward. There were others from the Konoha 9 as well, but mostly those three. Shisui got a little vindictive delight in seeing Sasuke go through a very terrible and awkward emo phase, but Sasuke had turned out like a model. That wasn’t much consolation. 

There were two photos on the desk. One was Sakura and Naruto and Sasuke standing with a dark haired man with a scar giving the camera a thumbs up. The second was one of Sasuke and Itachi somewhere with a nice view in the background. They were both looking at the camera, and Sasuke was smiling with an arm around Itachi’s shoulders. Sasuke also had Itachi’s class schedule with notes about various meetings Itachi attended on the table, listing when Itachi needed rides and when he was taking the bus.

Shisui felt incredibly petty and jealous and hurt.

But he also thought, someone who could make him feel so violently so quickly obviously deserved someone as obviously devoted and exceptionally beautiful and talented as Sasuke seemed to be.

“Shisui?” 

Shisui jumped, squeaking and almost throwing everything. He turned slowly to see Itachi. Itachi pushed his bangs back from his face and blinked at Shisui.

“Sorry,” Shisui whispered. “I was--” He held up the drink and crackers. “--bringing you these. From Sakura.”

“Oh,” Itachi leaned heavily on the doorframe. “I’d already gone back to my room. . .”

“She told me I was…” Shisui gestured with the crackers. “Snooping.” Itachi smiled a little as if amused by the admission before he took a deep breath and wobbled into the room.

“I need to sit…” And he did, on the edge of the bed with a flop and a sigh as he leaned against the headboard, closing his eyes.

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault,” Itachi said. “And it’s not bad. Everyone just overreacts.”

“I gave you food poisoning,” Shisui started.

“The bad festival food did,” Itachi corrected very gently. He looked very comfortable on Sasuke’s bed. He reached over and grabbed a small pillow to hold over his stomach.

“I still feel shitty about it.” Shisui hesitantly walked over and offered Itachi the drink. Itachi opened one eye before taking it.

“Don’t, and Sasuke doesn’t blame you for it. That’s just his face,” Itachi added. Shisui looked at all the smiling and sullen and smirking faces of Sasuke in the room. 

“He does always look a little constipated,” Shisui allowed himself a cheap shot.

“He doesn’t like to wear his glasses, so he has to squint to see sometimes,” Itachi pointed to the line between his own eyebrows. “It makes it worse. He’s really much nicer than everyone thinks.” Shisui wanted to giggle, but he felt guilty. Itachi sipped at the drink, grimacing a little.

“The way to get him talking is to ask about his snakes,” Itachi motioned towards the rack of snakes. “Or whatever topic he’s really into for the month. That can vary a lot, but it’s generally something about international politics--or the animal shelter.” 

“The animal shelter?”

Itachi nodded. “Kiba started the volunteering effort with everyone, but Sasuke’s really good at matching cats to people.”

“He does matchmaking for cats?” Shisui couldn’t imagine that. Well, he could, but in an absurdist fashion.

“Sasuke is made up of layers, and the firth in you go, the softer they are,” Itachi smiled very gently when he said it and he looked at Shisui directly.

“You should ask him out in front of people. He’ll respect the risk more, and he’ll also be more likely to say yes.”

“_What_?”

Itachi didn’t quite roll his eyes. “Shisui, every time we’re in the cafeteria I catch you watching Sasuke, and whenever he comes over to talk to me you go all red and tongue tied and you’re never tongue tied. I did try to get him to come to the festival for you, but that didn’t work, so it’s best if you just ask him out directly.”

Shisui had had a history professor who liked to use the term poleaxed a lot, and Shisui had thought it was a stupid expression. Right now he felt poleaxed.

“But you--you and Sasuke are…” Shisui realized as he said it, he was wrong. Oh he had been so wrong. “Dating.”

Itachi’s face scrunched. He looked amused and a little disgusted. “We’re not. Sasuke’s like a brother to me, but I guess he could come off as an overprotective boyfriend ...” Itachi looked speculative. “But we’re not, so that clears the way for--”

“I wasn’t looking at Sasuke,” Shisui blurted. “I was looking at you.” This was not the thing to say, because if Itachi had been trying to set Shisui up with Sasuke, then Itachi obviously was not interested.

“Why?”

“Because _you’re_ the one I wanted to ask out!” Shisui almost shouted. If anything Itachi looked even more bewildered. He looked shocked. He stared at Shisui. This was all a terrible mistake.

“Oh.” That was startled.

“Oh.” Itachi said that in a much different tone. He looked away and frowned. “That’s...different.” Shisui was crushing the crackers in his sweaty grip as he waited for some kind of reaction from Itachi. 

“Are you asking me out? Now?” 

“Yes?”

“Oh.” Itachi looked at Shisui, and his face was going red. “I’m sorry, no one’s ever asked me out before.” Itachi’s face kept on getting red.

“You can say no.”

“No--I mean--” Itachi threw up a hand, getting even redder. “Yes--.” Itachi stopped, absolutely panicked, one hand still up in a stop motion and blocking most of his face. Shisui’s face had gone red too. 

“....maybe not a music festival this time?” Shisui suggested. That did it. Itachi giggled. It sounded deranged. Shisui loved it. Itachi lowered his hand. 

He smiled. “Maybe not.”

“So that’s a yes?” Shisui sat down on the edge of the bed and handed Itachi the crackers. Itachi took them solemnly.

“It’s a yes.”

Something squeaked.

Itachi’s head whipped around and his eyes narrowed. Shisui turned to see someone scramble away from the door, and then it burst open. Uzumaki Naruto bounced into the room, arms thrown wide. He was only wearing a towel. Sakura ad flattened herself to the door to avoid Naruto's headlong rush.

“Congratulations!” Naruto beamed. 

“Naruto, it’s a date, not a marriage,” Sakura hissed.

“You never know, it could be, one day. Every relationship should properly cherished and celebrated,” Naruto clapped Shisui on the shoulder as he went by, and wrapped Itachi in a hug. Itachi looked like a cat being hugged by a toddler, trying desperately not to spill his drink.

“You were--” Itachi pushed Naruto away. “_Eavesdropping._”

“Itachi, I know how you feel. I gotta be ready to swoop in if he broke your heart,” Naruto insisted. “And call Sasuke so he could break his knees.”Naruto turned on Shisui. “What’s your name?”

“It’s _Shisui_.” Sakura marched in, grabbing Naruto and shoving him towards the door. “Get out--get out!”

“We won’t tell Sasuke you were snooping in his room!” Naruto called back as Sakura forcibly pushed him from the room. Shisui almost missed the thumbs up she shot Itachi. Shisui glanced back to Itachi, who looked absolutely mortified.

Wait. 

“How _do_ you feel?” Shisui asked.

“I’m going to vomit.” Itachi had gone five shades paler now, sinking back onto the bed. Shisui grabbed the wastebasket and gave it to Itachi, who hugged it with one arm. Shisui also took the drink from Itachi so he could clutch the wastebasket properly.

“We have to finish the project,” Itachi said, voice echoing out of the trashcan.

Shisui thought Itachi might be trying to change the topic, but since he did look like he was going to throw-up, Shisui let it slide. “I’ve got the notes. We can work on it.” Itachi looked up with a little half smile that made Shisui’s heart dip. That was five thousand times better than any smile Sasuke had gotten.

“Alright.” 

And maybe sitting on a futon doing a music appreciation project while trying desperately to find some kind of music his new and regrettably tone-deaf boyfriend would like was not prime first date material, but it felt perfect.


	3. 10/18 Day Six: Domestic AU

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I chose to take this prompt as literally as possible.

The first apartment is only one room, no space. Coming from the family house, sprawling and empty, it is instantly claustrophobic. It's summer, and there is no air conditioning. The window must be open at all times, which doesn't help. The fan is small and cheap plastic. Every liquid that can be frozen is frozen before it is consumed.

The bathroom is an open closet, providing no privacy even with the room divider made up of things scavenged from a dumpster. Everything is cracked and chipped and breaking a mug is a cardinal sin.

There's a broken-in twin mattress, too small for four elbow and knees. It doesn't contain either body well, letting limbs spill off and continually dumping someone onto the floor in the night. It creaks. It bruises elbows and spines and knees when too much pressure is applied. It's finally thrown out the memorable day it tears and cuts Itachi's hand to the bone and he needs stitches. There is forever a scar.

The kitchen is a hot plate, a refrigerator, and an electric kettle. Noodles, soups and take-out rule the day. A struggling herb garden dies in the heat of the window. The walls, floor, and ceiling have a perpetual odor of friend food and spoiled milk.

It is always too hot too cold too small, but it is the kind of close desired, and everything else can be put up with for that.  
~  
The second apartment is three rooms. One room for sleeping, one room for living, and finally a bathroom door. It fills slowly with essentials: The bed--a full bed with enough space for all elbows and knees and a surprising growth spurt. A dresser and ironing board for clothes that need attention. A small cat bed. A larger cat bed. 

The kitchen gathers a full assortment of coffee mugs and tea strainers. Pots and pans trickle in on request, but take-out containers find themselves still often reused. There is a low table for meals. A counter. Plants begin to slowly creep in: first herbs, then aloe, and then the assorted useless ones that are always last to die.

The heat works. The air conditioning works. The water only runs hot for fifteen minutes at a stretch and only that if one gets to it before five in the morning. In the winter this is a tragedy, and doubling up on showers is never quite as efficient as it sounds.

The couch becomes a second bed for restless nights. It is the shamed place for the puking sick or slovenly drunk. It is the huddled retreat of the spurned and broken-hearted. It's the receptacle of angry notes and forgotten change. It's the mending place and neutral ground. It is the place where arguments end and mend. And where the cat will always puke.

The second is the pinnacle, and after is the fall.  
~  
The third is only a room in a place no one wants to stay long, and everyone prays to leave on their own two feet.  
~  
The fourth, fifth, and sixth are forgettable and duplicated. Single occupancy rooms or apartments or dorms room in an outward spiral from the impact crater left behind. They hold sour thoughts, bitter regrets, forgettable flings, and disastrous one-night stands. They all blend and blur together, smearing into a strained cathartic nostalgia.

The seventh is something special, something silent, something joyous and impressionable. It is on the ocean. It is reckless. It is wild. It is freedom.

And, perhaps, it was love.  
~  
The eighth is an apartment. It begins as two bedrooms, each bed big enough to two elbows and two knees and every inch of growth.

The kitchen is a cultured accumulation of preference and exposure. Coffee and tea mugs must be whittled down to the favored few to make room for shot glasses, wine glasses, and other oddities now considered essentials.

An entire balcony space is given over to every plant that could possibly grow something edible, and five interlopers that should bloom but never get beyond hopeful buds. Two chairs squeeze in among the plants, one little table for forgetting tea and books on. 

The water in the bathroom will run as hot as desired for at least an hour (or more). Books move from separate stacks in bedrooms to communal spaces such as the table and the couch. Workspace congeals in the shared communion of this space. Essays and thesis notes litter every surface. Grocery lists and maintenance issues stick to the fridge. There are class schedules and teaching schedules and notes about who is coming over when.

And one day there is an apology. A note.

A confession.

A concession. A forgotten little smile. The entire space breathes out the building tension.

The notes and thesis statements and proofs and essays to be graded and sighed over move into one bedroom. The space fills with bookcases and books and laptops.

The second bed is made to accommodate four elbows and four knees. It is not quite wide enough, but there is by now enough practice sharing space it does not matter. Only so much room is required when touching is a prerequisite to sleep. The bed barely creaks. It does not break. No one rolls off in the night.

There is the second bed for restless nights. A chair in the bathroom for sick ones. A promise for tense ones to work it out before sleeping. Drunk nights still end on the couch. Or the floor. Or on the balcony (with one broken arm).

The floor gets scratched. A wall gets broken (above the headboard), and the water will run warm for exactly seventy-three minutes. There is another stray kitten, another cat bed. Things change and move. Walls are painted. Ideas and tentative plans begin to form, skirting the previous dissolution.

It sits oddly between a new beginning and a resumption all in one small home.  
~  
The ninth is a small house, forgotten and abused and optimistically chosen for the price. It is a configuration of broken pipes, leaking walls, badly positioned outlets and wiring that should have caused seven different house fires.

The first fight is a screaming one, two days after signing papers. It ends with wine and a sheet tossed over the "original hardwood floors" and several bruises.

The house is a constant assertion of will. There is no simply taking things as they are. There must be decisions. There must be opinions and concessions and apologies.

Those aren't any of the things to fight about.

The things to fight about are deeper, rooted in flesh and blood and family. The ninth place is a home, and a family lives in a home. Certain stances are being made, passively or not. Certain designations are avoided, sidestepped, pushed and bickered about.

_Building_ is happening. Breaking is a given. Hard truths are buried under floorboards, smuggled out in the dead of night to smoky bars and smothered under too many shots with friends who like to agree too much. Discrepancies in _love_ and _dating_ and _partners_ litter the floors. And agreement on boyfriends gets painted into the bedroom walls. A maybe on the stair railing (that breaks and ends in another broken arm). Demolition gives vent to frustration.

Nothing is perfect. Everything is cracked and off-kilter and not quite the way it should be.

But it is more than enough.  
~  
The tenth is a promise. It's a departure. It's a definitive stand and definition.

It is a take us or leave us. A space for dreams and forevers and everything 

It is neither perfect nor flawless.

It is love. It is their life. It is a commitment to _you and me forever, as long as we both shall live._

It is their home, just between the two of them.

And that is all they have ever needed.


	4. 10/16: Day 7: Shisui's Birthday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Having finished one WIP I'm gearing up for the next, so I'm dipping back into the Wind Over Tide or Waves universe for Shisui being his nonsensical stuff and Itachi wishing he had murdered Shisui instead of subject himself to this continued degradation of reality.
> 
> So this will likely not make much sense if you're not familiar with this series: https://archiveofourown.org/series/107450

"When is your birthday?" Itachi asked.

"You know I wasn't born, I was vomited fully formed from the ocean on a stormy night," Shisui deflected as they walked. They had about fifteen minutes before they had to part ways.

Itachi, inured to this kind of chatter through years of exposure, did not even question Shisui and stuck to his goal. "When did _that_ happen?"

"I can't just tell you that. Itachi, you have no understanding of the greater mysteries of the universe. Such knowledge can't just be _told_. It has to be discovered through meditation and deep soul searching accompanied with perilous ritual--"

"You have no idea when you were born, do you?" Itachi cut Shisui off.

Shisui sighed. "And now you're cursed. You can't interrupt mystical explanations like that."

"Yes. I am cursed by your presence."

"I'm a curse? Pardon, I didn't realize. I will begin to act my part."

Itachi stopped walked and turned to look at Shisui. He took his time, dark eyes taking Shisui in before giving the most bland look to ever come from an Uchiha face. "I could have had the Mangekyou."

"You could still," Shisui suggested.

"If I kill a god, won't I be double cursed?" The teasing wasn't in the tone. That was straight and serious. It was in the corners of Itachi's eyes and the almost curve of his lips.

"Go to hell," Shisui bumped hard into Itachi's shoulder as he walked by. 

"Do I have to find the way myself, or are you going to take me there?" Itachi asked as he fell into step behind Shisui.

"That's it." Shisui spun around and began walking backward. "You're cursed. _Cursed_. All your hair will fall out, and you'll get a weird rash that will never go away and constantly itch."

"That's convenient. I've been thinking about cutting it off anyway."

"No!" Shisui gasped in horror. Itachi smiled, that smile of old that lifted Shisui's soul a little higher and widened the possibilities of the world.

"Will you curse me again if I do?" Itachi asked.

"I'd never be able to look at your bulbous head again," Shisui countered.

"Ah, what a tragedy." Itachi still grinned as he spoke. Shisui broke in these moments. His hard shell cracked and ruptured under the sheer bubbling _joy_. He thought he could float away through the trees, and only the weight of his shoes kept him grounded. He did not understand how the entire world could not be in love with the curve of this smile, or the subtle dip of Itachi's head.  
~  
Shisui had forgotten the conversation when Itachi met him with a neatly wrapped package. Shisui looked at it with suspicion. 

"Are these body parts?" Shisui asked, gingerly taking the parcel.

"When have I ever carried around body parts?" Itachi asked as he sat down on the bench beside Shisui. They were at an abandoned way station. In previous years Shisui had stopped here for a meal, but someone had killed the owner and his family. Now everyone said it was haunted.

Shisui had no idea why they would think that. It couldn't be the vindictive, bloody deaths of people who would murder someone just trying to get by could have anything to do with it, could it?

"So what is it?" Shisui held the package up and it rattled.

"You could open it and find out," Itachi stretched out his legs, pointing his toes and rotating his ankles.

"No, why is it? What is it for?" Shisui held the box over his head. He rattled it again. Rocks? Not heavy enough for all rocks.

"I," Itachi started. Shisui could immediately hear something off in Itachi's tone. "Went to the edge of the ocean on a moonless night. I followed the signs that I found there and divined the portents from past atrocities and present disasters. I sacrificed sea creatures in a sacred cove in an ocean cave just before dawn and I divined--"

Itachi had slide into Shisui's tone and accent, the more rhymic speech patterns. The story teller's cadence.

"Today is the auspicious date of your birth." Itachi looked over at Shisui, that pleased glimmer in his eyes. That _deliciously_ satisfied tension at the very corners of his lips indicating the extreme pleasure derived from this moment. The almost smug glee at playing Shisui's own game when Shisui had least expected it.

"But you didn't sacrifice a virgin?" Shisui sighed as he slowly pulled open the cloth wrapping the box.

"Having one carry out the rituals seemed a better use of virgins," Itachi replied, a little dry.

Shisui looked at the black lacquered box. Someone had painted a detailed seascape on it. Shisui would hear the sound of rough surf in his ears as he opened the box and peered inside. Itachi watched without turning his head.

There were stones. Smooth river rocks with strange colors or veining through them. There was a little bag of hard candied sweets. There was a beautiful widemouthed comb, of the kind Shisui generally fought through his hair. The best was a very intricate hanging charm Shisui pulled out to dangle from his fingers. Itachi didn't even have to explain it. This was something meant to bring longevity, luck, and good health while keeping away evil spirits and accidents. Shisui knew it was expensively made from very fine materials and had an intricately braided and incredibly long cord of human hair incorporated through it. That, Shisui knew, was Itachi's.

This was Itachi trying is best to give Shisui _presents_ and not just things he could use. The charm did not count as useful to Itachi, because he didn't believe in them. Shisui lowered the charm back down slowly, feeling guilt rising in him. This had taken effort and thought.

"....my birthday is October nineteenth," Shisui admitted, closing the box with a sigh. He couldn't look at Itachi yet.

"...why didn't you just tell me that?"

"Because," Shisui shifted. "It's not auspicious enough. There's nothing _special_ about it." Shisui heard the childish petulance of his reasoning. "Any, what's the point of knowing the exact day? It's only useful if you're trying to read someone's future."

"Were you told your birthday doomed you to a life of obscurity?" Itachi asked, digging his little fingers into the crevices of Shisui's lies.

"You know how old I am, and it's not like anything changes on that day." Shisui shrugged.

"_Shisui._"

"It isn't like you actually did all of that stuff anyway," Shisui continued. Itachi's expression didn't change.

"_**Shisui.**_"

"_Because_," Shisui finally grumbled. "There was this old hag on the island my mom would leave me with, and she'd always say I was born under a bad sign, and then when I got off the island every time I got cards read or my fortune told everyone was always how I was under a bad star or cursed or bad things would happen because of the day my mom pushed me out."

"....so you're avoiding a bad fate by pretending to be born a different day?"

"Don't knock it. Shit things always happen on my birthday the second I think about it being my birthday or anyone acknowledges it. It's a cursed day, because it is fucking under a bad star, and I am thrice more cursed than you could ever hope to be," Shisui groused. Shisui could see Itachi shaking his head and giving the sky a long-suffering look. Unlike Itachi, Shisui understood the importance of not tempting fate, and while all the things that had happened on his birthdays had not been that bad yet, they would get there.

"What day do you celebrate your birthday?" Itachi asked.

"Unlike you mortals, I celebrate my existence all year round and don't save it for one day of the year." Shisui crossed his arms and sniffed. "I grant you leave to do the same."

"When do you decide you're a year older?" Itachi asked, still suffering slowly.

"Whenever I feel like it." Shisui elbowed Itachi. "Answer me this, my genius apostle, _why_ did your enlightened and scientific self pick today of all days?"

Shisui would say because Itachi had to pick some arbitrary day and had probably tried to pick a reasonable date from when Shisui's mother had left Mist to guess Shisui's age. . .only he was off by a lot if he had done that.

"Is it because you can't count to nine? Have I finally uncovered your one weakness?"

"No," Itachi finally looked at Shisui. "Can you not think of anything significant about today's date?"

Shisui knew Itachi's birthday, so it couldn't be that. He couldn't think of any kind of holiday that might be going on. Itachi waited.

"It is. . ." Shisui scrambled in his mind for something. ". . .the day of the Nakano Shrine Festival?"

"No. It's--"

Shisui held up a hand. "Don't tell me." Itachi closed his mouth and waited. 

Shisui pulled up the most horrified expression he could. "Is it _Kisame's_ birthday?"

"Shisui."

"Okay, not that, its...." Shisui tried to wave Itachi to silence. Itachi batted Shisui's hand away, exasperation peaking over the sadness for the moment.

"Today," Itachi said, a little more loudly. "Is the day a humble surveyor's apprentice landed on a small island--"

And it came back to Shisui in a visceral flash. His first glimpse of Itachi. The first words they had said. The plump cheeks and solemn eyes and the catastrophic chain of events that had led them all here.

"It's our anniversary," Shisui gasped.

"I wouldn't go that far--"

"It's an _anniversary gift!_" Shisui jumped up and thrust the little box up. He turned to face Itachi, whose face was filling with regret.

"A _proposal!_" Shisui pointed at Itachi, who's face had shifted from regretting the conversation to regretting _everything_. 

"What," Itachi asked, with the tone of someone who had received a mortal injury and decided to press on anyway. "Am I proposing?"

"_Obviously_," Shisui stumbled. He hesitated because he had expected Itachi to shut him down. He had not at all expected to be indulged. Itachi did not indulge Shisui's madness. He cut the legs out from under it. and pulled Shisui out of the quagmire of his runaway nonsense.

But Itachi just sat there, letting Shisui's shit grow steadily deeper and waiting for the grand finale.

Shisui pulled the box back into his chest. "It's a _pledge_ of your undying loyalty and constant affection _and_ tireless service."

"To?" 

"Me," Shisui finished primly.

"And you needed a box for that?"

"You--you picked the box," Shisui felt rattled. "It's an incredibly insufficient offering, but I am making an exception for you."

Itachi stood up, adjusting the huge cloak that hid the majority of his body in ways that made him look completely insubstantial.

"I suppose," Itachi drawled in Shisui's slower accent, pulling his words out gently. "There is only one way I can make up for cheating you of a proper pledge of all my. . ." Itachi stopped as if to consider and counted on his finger. "Loyalty, affection, and service."

Itachi looked up from his damnably tiny fingers to Shisui. Half a year ago they had been trying to murder each other again. A year from now they would likely be at odds again, but Itachi hit Shisui with that straight, no-nonsense stare that punched straight through every single defensive wall of bullshit Shisui had. It terrified Shisui. It shook him to his dishonest core because that stare said _I see you._ Shisui could slather himself in five hundred different layers of nonsensical mystical chatter, and Uchiha Itachi would _still_ see the truth of the matter.

But he would let Shisui complete his song and dance because Uchiha Itachi was _kind_ that way.

The stare hit Shisui in such a way, he couldn't properly react to Itachi grabbing his wrist except to freeze. Itachi's fingers were chilled and delicate on Shisui's wrist. Itachi had to rise up on his toes, and Shisui should have had more than enough time to move before Itachi kissed him, firmly, on the lips.

Itachi rocked back onto his heels. "Hopefully," He sounded a little breathless. "That makes up for it."

Shisui stared into the trees, trying to come to terms with how much he wanted to puke and explain how shitty a kiss that had been all while desperately wanting to kiss Itachi again.

_Properly_.

"I--" Shisui managed to look at Itachi, who was gently pink around his cheeks and on his ears. " I---" Shisui's face was going red from his neck up, and Itachi was getting a helpless little grin on his face that was completely making Shisui lose track of every thought his body had ever had while he clutched the stupid box to his chest as if it could somehow save him.

"_You--_" Shisui corrected. Shisui couldn't even form a thought. he couldn't make words shape on his tongue. Itachi grinned a little wider.

"Me?" Itachi asked, lightness and laughter dancing on the edges of his voice as Shisui had never heard before.

Oh no.

Oh _fuck_

Ameterasu's _tits_.

This kid was going to _absolutely_ ruin Shisui.

And Shisui was going to adore him for every single second of it.

"That was not _fair_," Shisui finally said.

"Then I take it back," Itachi had settled back, watching Shisui with a cat's contentment. It had come so far from the agonized despair Shisui had first found, he wanted to weep. He wanted to tell Itachi right now, at this moment, how incredibly _vital_ Itachi had become to the very fabric of Shisui's being. He really wanted to kiss Itachi hard enough to make him breathless. He wanted to trip him over the bench behind them and find every secret crevice and nook of his body. The air was alive with promise and invitation and possibility, and Shisui felt such a burgeoning _emotion_ he didn't have the capacity to properly express it.

And he was agonizingly aware of the _fragility_ of happiness on Itachi's face. He understood the delicate ground he stood on, and the way Itachi had pushed and stretched himself and his emotions to give Shisui even this silly moment and gentle teasing and _love_.

"Shisui?" Itachi touched Shisui's wrist again, voice unsure.

"Shut up." Shisui pushed the box against Itachi's chest. "Don't--" Shisui's forehead his the top of Itachi's head, and Shisui could smell Itachi's hair and his breath and his sweat.

Itachi let Shisui lean on him. He let Shisui's cold thumb brush his jaw. Itachi allowed his head to be tipped back. He accepted the meagerest offering of Shisui's affection he had ever given anyone graciously on his lips.

"Happy Birthday," Itachi said, low and rough and gentle enough to peel back every protective layer wrapped around Shisui's soul.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Brought to you by my younger brother, who always has awful things happen on his birthday, including the death of his FAVORITE author.


	5. Day 12: 10/25 : Modern AU

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "But the event is over!" you say. It is, but the amount of insanity going on right now added to it's time for SAD to kick in means I'm going to not stress and finish what I which prompts I want to finish.
> 
> ALSO, I found an old half written fic of Shisui trying to become a cowboy and I had to write Uchiha boys and horses.
> 
> Disclaimer: I know a lot about horses, but very little about shows, so apologies in advance to any real horse people who read this.

"I can't believe you chose this as your first show back," Shisui said for the tenth time that hour. "Eventing. Jesus Christ, Itachi, _Eventing_."

"If I can make it through this, I should be golden for all other competitions, right?" Itachi teased back lightly. The possibility of being, not just in the saddle, but in the show ring, had him euphoric. Shisui's worry could not touch Itachi. He was floating.

He had missed _competing._ He had missed every detail about it from travel logistics to the actual performance itself.

"Today's dressage," Itachi added, trying to mollify Shisui. Every Uchiha's first _true_ discipline was dressage. Madara called it the only way to compete on a horse. He specialized in breeding for it and trained the elite for it. People would sell their soul to have the grizzled old man tell them they and their hundred thousand dollar horse were a disgrace to the sport and should both be made into shoe leather. Itachi and Shisui had been groomed and fully expected to be the next kings of the sport.

When Shisui had taken his world-class dressage horse to a decently high level of a reining championship, Madara had completely disowned Shisui, sent the cops to get the horseback, very nearly gotten Shisui arrested, _and_ banned Shisui from the barn. That had resulted in Itachi not setting foot near the barn in protest, which had eventually led to Shisui being allowed back on the grounds.

All of that had made Itachi's switch to jumping far more palatable.

Digression aside, today would be the easy day. The _safe_ day.

"Tomorrow is _cross country_," Shisui went on, staring away into space in abject horror. "_Cross country._"

Itachi patted Baby on the neck. "I'm sorry he's this way." Baby pricked delicate ears and turned his rather blocky head to Itachi. The little bay stud had been Shisui's project for years, dropped from a prized imported mare and gifted to Shisui to train when he'd finally consented to work full time at the family stables. Baby had been a bribe, but he was worth it. Shisui had always been good with young things.

"Baby will take care of me," Itachi added, come around the back of the stallion to look at Shisui. Shisui was holding onto Baby's reins and simply staring into space.

"He's just a baby," Shisui looked at Itachi. "You're both _babies._"

"_Baby_," Itachi patted the horse's rump. "Is international champion bloodlines and champion stable trained, and this _baby_\--" Itachi pointed to himself and felt his face go red as he said it. "Is a FEI World Equestrian Games gold medalist. We'll be fine. My ego may never recover if I don't place, but we'll be _fine_."

"Last time I watched you jump--" Shisui stopped. It hadn't phased Itachi in this way. He didn't remember it. He had simply swung back into the saddle as soon as medically cleared and pointed the genial and reliable Oscar at a fence. He hadn't considered anything else. Itachi had been waiting to complete the ride in his mind. You didn't quit and you always got back on.

Shisui had been unable to stop living that moment.

Itachi closed off Shisui's sentence with a palm towards Shisui. "You're here, and you're my good luck charm." Shisui had started that, declaring his baby cousin his "good luck charm" to justify carrying Itachi everywhere and to every show. The first time Itachi had won blue he had smiled and returned the favor.

Madara always said luck was a lie. They won because they had the training and good horses. They won because they put the hours and years into the sport with a single-minded dedication that would not allow for anything but mastery.

Shisui stopped for a second, looking at Itachi. He looked again, eyes refocussed and gaze entirely _different._ Itachi felt the track of eyes up his body like he hadn't before. "Should I tell you exactly how I'm going to get you out of this getup afterward?"

"Yes, go ahead and tell me, because these are getting hung up and bagged with the greatest care, and you're not going to touch them," Itachi countered. He placed his top hat on his head and gave Shisui his most challenging look.

"....I don't have any defense because you're in tight white pants, you've got a crop, and your hair's in a bun," Shisui admitted. He pushed the top hat up and leaned in to kiss Itachi softly in the mouth.

"For luck," Shisui said as he pulled back.  
~  
The Uchiha family revolved around horses. Uchiha Madara had founded a stable steeped in tradition and already possessing prize horses. How he came by the horses and the money no one could ever quite say. Shisui thought he must have murdered someone. Whatever the case, Madara became a household name when it came to top horses, and _the name_ in Dressage.

Itachi had been doomed to live in the show ring the moment he was born. He attended his first show in utero. Mikoto barely took a break to be pregnant, as three months after Itachi was born, she was getting back into condition to ride in the next season. Dressage was her passion, which was likely the entire reason Madara had orchestrated her marriage to his woefully unequestrian grandson Fugaku.

Fugaku's work with horses only extended to accounting for the family business. Working for family he likely could have raised Itachi and worked, but Fugaku lacked any kind of nurturing instinct, even towards his son. Thus, Itachi was handed off to Shisui's grandfather Kagami. Kagami worked at the stable full time but juggled that schedule to include a small human in need of the best love and care possible.   
Madara was Kagami's uncle, which made Kagami Fugaku's first cousin once removed, and Itachi Kagami's first cousin twice removed. It made Shisui and Itachi second cousins once removed.

Kagami strapped his tiny first cousin to his chest to teach lessons, placed a basinet in his office, and made Itachi the instant mascot of the stable. Shisui's first memories of Itachi were of running off the school bus to grab his snacks from the house, and rocketing to the stable where he would find Itachi waking from his afternoon nap and ready for his afternoon snack. The highlight of Shisui's young life was getting a grumpy Itachi out of his bassinet to be snuggled and fed.

Before long it was Itachi and Shisui racing off the bus together to throw themselves into the stable they had left only hours before. They had lessons and barn chores and shows to prepare for because it was never a question of if they were interested in horses or showing. They were simply assumed to be interested, and they were marvelously adept having grown up steeped in horses and terminology and born to _ride_.

Shisui was fickle, wanting to train and breed and compete all in turns, but Itachi had one solid goal. He would be what his mother had wanted to be. Itachi would become a world class equestrian.

And, of course, he did.   
~  
Itachi and Shisui crammed into the small living space of the gooseneck trailer for the night. The novelty of it still fascinated Itachi. He watched Shisui brushing his teeth, something he had watched Shisui do multiple times before. They had slept together for years, two budding genius children constantly thrown together to be shuttled from show to show to trainer. Shisui's space had been Itachi's space. His things Itachi's things. Itachi had been an extension of Shisui, and Shisui had been the center of Itachi's world.

Nothing had really changed, but everything had a different meaning.

"What?" Shisui asked as he looked up. 

"I feel nostalgic." Itachi shrugged. He was wearing Shisui's T-shirt. Shisui paused and looked at Itachi as he had recently begun to. He did not take for granted Itachi's presence as he used to. He looked at Itachi, close inspection and evaluation with a hungry edge always lurking beyond the civil politeness.

"I'm realizing I always missed you when you were gone," Shisui said as he walked over to the bed and sat down. It creaked. "When I left or when you left. I was always waiting for you to come back."

"You couldn't get away from me for almost a decade," Itachi pointed out. "Naturally you'd feel the absence of your shadow when I wasn't there." 

"I could stand another decade like that," Shisui admitted softly.

Itachi felt the smile growing from somewhere deep inside. "Only a decade?"

"You're kind of a patronizing little shit," Shisui admitted. Itachi laughed as Shisui leaned over to kiss his temple. "For luck."

"Do you know what I don't need tomorrow?" Itachi asked, turning to push Shisui back and climb on top of him, pulling off the oversized shirt and throwing it over Shisui's face. "Luck."  
~  
The fall happened in the jump off. Shisui was watching with all the stable's students who could make it in because they always watched Itachi ride. Madara watched in his separate study because he never missed any of Itachi's rides either. Itachi might not have gone the proper way of Dressage, but he was still Madara's favorite.

Itachi was riding a large gelding call Scorpio who was doing well. They'd jumped together before, and Itachi had been very optimistic about what the horse could do when Shisui had spoken to him yesterday. They started clean, but Scorpio faltered a little as they came down from the third vertical.

Shisui should have known it then. He blamed the horse as he saw the stumble, but the horse was doing best he could. Next was a tricky liverpool that had given almost everyone trouble. Itachi was a master He had the horse turned and ready and they rose into the air. The take-off was too early, but the gelding was a scopey jumper he could clear it. He would be fine--

But Shisui was standing before the horse even landed.

The horse was perfect. Itachi was not. Itachi _was_ perfect. He always had perfect form, perfect timing, perfect balance, but not today. Scorpio stumbled as he landed, nearly falling, but kept himself up because he was a champion as much as Itachi. It was not Scorpio's fault he had become unbalanced.

On the replay, it was obvious Itachi had lost that perfect form a jump before. On replay, Shisui could see the slow fall of Itachi's coordination as he slowly lost control of his body.

And fell.

Scorpio could not balance when his rider had become dead weight. Itachi fell, limp as a ragdoll he crashed from the saddle _under_ the staggering horse as the crowd rose and the announcers were shocked into silence.

And Shisui stood thousands of miles away, watching it on a tiny television screen.

Someone was on the field, kneeling by Itachi in seconds, but Itachi did not move. He lay crumpled. Hands were waving. Hands were bringing in medics and stretchers and Shisui had never wished more to be instantly _somewhere else._  
~  
"I am fine," Itachi insisted as they waited for his turn at the course.

"I should be riding," Shisui insisted.

"Shisui, I am medicated and the doctor cleared. If I feel dizzy or lightheaded I will stop." Itachi leaned back into Shisui a bit, holding Baby's reins loosely. Baby watched everything around him with growing anticipation.

"I," Shisui said. "I am having a panic attack."

Itachi turned to look at Shisui. Shisui had a fixed stare, and Itachi realized Shisui meant every single worry he had said out loud. Shisui would fuss about things, but this was not idle griping. This was a compulsive terror he couldn't control. Itachi gripped Shisui's arm. "Do you need me to not ride?"

Shisui's eyes seemed to get wider. He looked at Itachi. He was sweating. He was _panicked_, and Itachi could see every hour Shisui had spent desperately trying to get to Itachi's side from half a world away pressing down into him and threatening to break him apart. 

"If you need me to, I won't." Itachi was ready. Itachi felt more than ready, but he did not have to do it now. For Shisui, he would wait. 

"No," Shisui managed. "You need to ride.

"I need you to ride.

"I need to see you do it." Shisui gripped Itachi's arm hard enough to bruise. Itachi did not remember anything of the fall. Scorpio had kicked him in the head, and he would never remember much of that day. He could see in replays how he had gone odd after the first jump. Even after seeing the images of the heart defect and passing out during the stress test, the fall from Scorpio did not seem real.

For Shisui, it had been his only reality. That fall--that forward faint under a jumping horse had dominated his life for the past year.  
~  
Shisui had noticed the growing tension between himself and Itachi. Mostly, Shisui put it down to the fall. Shisui was a nervous wreck over Itachi's fall. Itachi did not take being smothered well. 

Riders fell all the time, and Itachi had fallen before, but this was different. This was not a technical fault but an unknown biological failing of Itachi's body almost killing him. Something about the experience had put Shisui into a panic mode he couldn't turn off, and after freaking out on his beginner jumping class, Shisui went to a doctor. He had to be able to work with horses. He had to get over this hurdle like he told all his students.

No quitting. 

Itachi had always been Shisui's favorite person. Favorite being in the universe. Trying to unwrap that concept and the feeling of thinking he had just watched Itachi _die_ thousands of miles away in real-time took work. It took time. It took breaking down what Itachi was to Shisui in all the facets, including what he had been and had Itachi was _now_ to Shisui. It brought Shisui to a very strange place.

A place where Shisui realized who his twenty-one-year-old second cousin once removed was to him had changed. _Grown._ Itachi as a child had been an extension of Shisui. Shisui and Itachi had been a pair, always connected, and Shisui always knew where Itachi was and what he was doing and what he should be doing instead of what he was doing. 

Itachi as an adult--they were not a pair. Not in that same way. And seeing Itachi fall like that, Shisui had realized something.

Itachi was literally the person Shisui loved most in the entire world. No one else ever compared.

And seeing Itachi now so casually dressed in barn clothes and oversized T-shirts with his hair down or low ponytail or messy braids was fucking with Shisui's perspective and he was realizing he did not just love Itachi.

He was _in love_ with him. With his voice and his body and the fall of his hair and his collarbones and hands and legs and every little thing about Itachi seemed to be the most precious things in the world to Shisui.

And Itachi was at his _most_ on a horse. Itachi became more than mortal. He became something transcendent when he was on a horse. Even as an awkward teen Itachi had become grace incarnate in the saddle. Shisui had always loved to watch Itachi ride, and even more to ride with Itachi.

And now Shisui was going to have a panic attack because he had just opened the door to the indoor arena, and Itachi was riding Oscar around the ring. And some moron had set up jumps.

Itachi was jumping.

Itachi was cantering Oscar around and heading for the first jump. Shisui couldn't run, because you did not run in the barn. He watched Itachi sit stable in the saddle. Perfect balance. Perfect control. The doctor's had unearthed the reason for the faint, but they were skeptical that it could be completely cured with medications. It could be possible exertion would cause another faint from a saddle at high speed, or it might never happen again.

The possibility would just always be there.

Itachi set Oscar to the first jump. A small one. Barely a jump. Oscar cleared it. Itachi didn't even waver in the saddle. He had poise and collection in spades, looking every inch a professional as they devoured the next set of jumps. Shisui had made it to the fence as they came to the highest jump, a little less than five feet. Itachi saw Shisui. He lost concentration.

Oscar soared over the jump. Itachi wobbled. He wavered. Shisui saw him falling and his head being caved in and--

Oscar gave a little buck, feeling the good spirits of the cool day, and Itachi tumbled off, rolling once and coming up perfectly on his feet as if it had been all been planned.

Shisui, however, nearly broke his ankle trying to vault over the arena railing to get to Itachi.  
~  
As Itachi and Baby finished the course, Itachi knew Shisui had never cheered so loudly for Itachi. As soon as Shisui had Baby's reins, Itachi threw himself into Shisui's arms and hugged him hard as he could.

Itachi was shaking hard. He'd fully expected to fall again. He'd been ready to feel lightheaded or dizzy or something as they had raced through the course. Each thrust in the air could be a moment to lose clarity. At the very least, Itachi had expected himself to overreact and overcorrect or something, but they had been _flawless_. Baby excelled at jumping, and he had taken Itachi over every jump with an eagerness and bravery that made Itachi's nerves quickly euphoric.

Itachi had been set free again. Every doubt and every fear that had whispered he would never feel that rush again had drained out of him. He was himself as he had not been since he'd hit the dirt in that far away arena.

"See?" Itachi said as Shisui put him down. "No luck needed."

And Shisui kissed him.

In front of everyone.

And the cameras.  
~  
They had been doing barn chores since three AM. Itachi was mucking out stalls, and they were alternating singing the songs that came on the radio. Shisui was enjoying himself despite the pain of his ankle. It helped that he had watched Itachi do a simple jump course yesterday on Oscar with no incident on either of their parts. Better, they were going to go out on a trail ride, just the two of them with no agenda and a lunch. Shisui would have to bareback it because his ankle wouldn't take being placed in a stirrup, but they were going. Itachi had packed the lunch himself. Shisui looked up and saw Itachi staring at him.

"What?" Shisui asked.

"Why aren't you married?" Itachi asked. "Or dating?"

"I haven't found the right person, and I spend eighteen hours a day covered in horse shit." Shisui stepped out and displayed his splattered jeans. "You're an international superstar. Why aren't you married?"

Itachi shook his head. "I take it the sedatives are helping?"

"Sleeping more than three hours a night makes me feel like a person," Shisui admitted. He was still terrified of losing Itachi. Terrified that smile would vanish. Terrified he would not be able to turn to that face for one last conversation.

But he realized he did not want a safe Itachi. Shisui wanted his Itachi. The one who had never seen a fence he didn't want to jump, or a course he wouldn't run.

Shisui leaned on the wall of the stall where Itachi was still scooping. He'd never gotten too big to help with the stable chores. Madara probably would have let him shirk, and no one else in the stable, sans Shisui and Sasuke, would ever call him out for it. Itachi paused and looked up at Shisui.

"There are other stalls," Itachi motioned around them. "They need mucking too."

"I love you," Shisui said, and it came out so easily.

Itachi paused, a slight catch in his motion before he frowned. "That's cute, but it doesn't mean I am going clean out your share of the stalls."

"No," Shisui pressed. This became more difficult when you had been professing your love for someone since they had been born. "Itachi. I'm _in love_ with you.That's what I mean." Shisui hooked his elbows over the stall door.

"What?" Itachi had gone still. He looked at Shisui with something bordering on disbelief. 

Shisui realized he had not even thought Itachi wouldn't return his feelings. It just seemed...natural. Easy. Like it should make perfect sense and this was how it should be. Shisui felt himself begin to panic. "I mean that I, uh, have developed romantic feelings for you?"

"And you just decided that now?" Itachi demanded. "_Right now_?"

"Well--"

"After _five years_ you couldn't wait five hours?" Itachi demanded, stepped closer to Shisui, lips trying to smile despite his aggrieved tone. "You had to spit that out right here, while we're _mucking stalls?_"

"Five--" The trail ride. The picnic lunch Itachi had packed this morning and insisted Shisui should not help him with. "Oh." Shisui felt his face going red. "You were going to--_today_?"

"No. I was going to get you out to the river, and see how things went." Itachi leaned against the side of the stall. "Because generally, every time I try to confess any feelings vaguely romantic, you make me feel like I'm five again, and all possibilities are crushed."

Itachi spread his hands. "And after all of my elaborate planning and ploys and conditioning and you just..." Itachi moved his hands sharply for emphasis, and Shisui saw how _flustered_ Itachi was under his exasperation. Itachi had not expected this. Itachi did not fully know how to cope with Shisui confessing when Itachi had been intent on himself confessing and been preparing for intense seduction tactics.

And Shisui could not stop beaming about that.

"You just come out with it, right here, while we're mucking stalls," Itachi finished, still not quite looking at Shisui, more caught in the moment than Shisui, definitely more undone.

"I'm sorry, the river would have been better," Shisui agreed. He leaned more on the stall. "Just. . .how long have you been trying to confess to me, Itachi?" Shisui's mind was racing back through the years to pinpoint any potential attempted confessions. _Five years_?

"I don't think we need to get into that." Itachi balked. Shisui decided he would figure it out later. "The important question is why, out of everything else I've done, did it take me almost getting my head cracked open on live television for you to finally stop treating me like your kid cousin?"

"It wasn't that. I just--you've grown. You're not a kid anymore," Shisui insisted. It was the fall. It was realizing he could lose Itachi at any time. It was adjusting his perspective and seeing the present Itachi for himself, as he stood on his own two feet. Itachi had grown into himself. He had grown up.

"Right, just magically, nothing to do with the fall." Itachi leaned on the other side of the stall door. He had a dangerous intensity on his face, exactly like he did before he went into the ring. Shisui felt the decision looming. He felt the pressure. He felt the doubt. He felt the rising finality. He felt the warmth of Itachi's breath on his lips as he leaned in.

"Is this why it takes you two so long to get chores done?" Sasuke asked loudly as he rattled through, dragging the feed cart. "Christ, can't you two keep your hands off each other for five minutes?" Sasuke grumbled as he pushed past them. He didn't even look back.

Shisui had a moment of clarity. "...everyone else already thinks we're dating, don't they?"

Itachi reached over the stall door and pulled Shisui in. Shisui had one moment to adjust before Itachi kissed him. Shisui gripped the top of the door and leaned in, savoring the moment.

"For fuck's sake!" Sasuke didn't quite shout because no one ever shouted in the stable. "You could at least do that in the tack room!"

Shisui pushed the door open and let Itachi drag him back into the stall, ignoring Sasuke disgusted tirade down the hall as Itachi's back hit the stall wall and Shisui got his hands into Itachi's messy braid.  
~  
The third day of Eventing was show jumping. Itachi walked the course. It wasn't the worst he'd ever run, and he felt confident Baby and he would do well. The horse had everything perfect from his parents, and Shisui had poured the proper amount of training and care into the animal. They might not steal the show, but they would be fine.

"You're shaking." Shisui admonished Itachi.

"I love jumping?" Itachi clenched his hands. "I've missed it."

"Maybe if you win Madara will stop sending me angry texts about my inappropriate behavior." Shisui sighed. "'_Molesting_ your cousin in broad daylight'--you knew we're barely even related."

Itachi rolled his eyes. "It's really good press for the inclusivity of the sport. In any case, it might as well come out so everyone can get over it before the bigger shows." 

"Hey," Shisui paused. He looked at Itachi. "Be safe, okay?"

"Cross country was much worse," Itachi said blandly. "We did perfectly well with that, remember? This shouldn't even make you sweat."

"Be," Shisui said with more force. "Safe." He held Itachi's shoulders, and Itachi felt the tension in Shisui's hands. 

"Always," Itachi promised. Shisui looked skeptical, but he gave Itachi a leg up onto Baby's back. Baby lifted his head and Itachi felt the lightness of his steps. The past two days seemed to have energized the horse, and Itachi felt his growing anticipation of the course to come.

Shisui walked with them to the gate, and as they waited he set his hand on Itachi's leg. Shisui looked out towards the ring and they could hear the sounds of the other horse in the ring. Shisui's hand didn't tighten on Itachi's leg, but he looked up at Itachi one more time.

"I promise," Itachi added. He had to do this. Shisui had to let him do this. They both knew Itachi couldn't just _stop._

Shisui leaned his forehead briefly against Itachi's knee, some silent benediction passing through to Itachi's bones before Shisui leaned back and patted Itachi on the leg as he would give a horse a reassuring pat. "Knock them dead, baby."

Itachi felt light as they entered the ring. He could feel Shisui behind him, watching. He heard the roar of the crowd and set Baby on the first fence. Baby's canter was effortless. He collected himself easily, intent on Itachi's commands and eager for the course. Shisui felt the horse ready himself. He felt the same sense of everything falling into place as Baby took the first jump.

Show jumping combined all of Itachi's strengths and favorite elements of riding together. He loved jumping. He was never bothered by the unexpected. His mind easily calculated strides and distance and speed and angles. He loved the rush of it. The control and power in measured parts combined with the athleticism of rider and horse. The world seemed to slow for him when he came into the ring.

They came for the second jump and cleared it easily. Itachi drew Baby in, feeling his eager desire to run, but Baby slowed down. He pushed against Itachi but he didn't fight. They cleared the third jump effortlessly. 

The weather had been wonderful with a breeze all day. It had made the horses a little more frisky than usual, but Itachi hadn't factored it in much. They came about for the fourth jump, and that was when riding a younger horse came back to bite Itachi. At some point during the day, someone had lost a white plastic bag. And that plastic bag had found its way from where it had been dropped to floating across the ring, jumping up to knee height as Baby got ready for the next jump--

Baby braked, stopping hard and bouncing on his front legs as he broke to the side and Itachi found himself in the air. He had a second to realize he was not just falling but being tossed into the jump before he crashed into the railings that made up the double oxer Baby had been headed for. Itachi's momentum slammed him through one fence and into the next. Poles fell everywhere. Baby thundered away in good-natured terror.

Before Itachi could figure out where his legs were and which direction was up in the middle of the destroyed jump, Shisui was leaning over him.

Itachi found his arm and gave Shisui a thumbs up.

"Smashed it."

Shisui looked like he wanted to cry, but he laughed and reached down to haul Itachi out of the wreckage as the announcer was exclaiming over how Uchiha Itachi, gold medalist in the sport, had become so confident in his abilities he had tried to complete a jump without his horse.


End file.
